Arguments for God

[Tank]

It strikes me there are a number of issues of style and presentation. Chris your posts are not immune to sounding a little patronising at times, I gather mine do to. Hack really does not suffer who he feels are fools gladly. And on RatSkep one has to deal with the likes of the moron Byers and frankly the only way to deal with a moronic idiot like him is to rubbish his ideas in the most vociferous ways. I think Hack is having to get used to dealing with you in a different way. Can you not tolerate his learning curve for the good of constructive discussion if he tries too? If Byers came here I reckon Whitney would give him 20 posts at most before showing him the door. Because of the staff structure at RatSkep and many forums trolls and morons get much too much air play before getting kicked out. The structure here of benevolent dictatorship is generally much better at rooting out extreme members. I thinks that one has to get a feel for the this forum and it took me a while.

Another issue is that the subject you're a jousting over is hideously complex and far reaching. Maybe you should could both start of something simpler and on common ground to get to appreciate each others good points.

I think if both of you just counted 10 before hitting the submit button and reread your posts as if you were the intended recipient you may moderate your own approach to each other and we won't end up in a downward spiral of mutual derision.

It would be a great misfortune if you both can't find a way to debate without belittling each other.

[Tank]

This also reminds me of the time I spent as  moderator at RDF. I wouldn't go near the philosophy section as people could be so spectacularly rude to each other and because of the obscure references "You're just a (insert philosophically rued term of choice)!" If you didn't have a Masters in Philosophy you wouldn't even get the reference until the other person came back with "How dare you blah, blah, blah!" And the mods would be discussing what had been said without a clue what the insult really was!  

[Heretical Rants]

This sounds Platonic.

...as does a lot of stuff I've read here.

[i_am_i]

I think I need to apologize. I've become used to opening threads without noticing what category they're in. This thread is in the Philosophy category, an area that I'm basically ignorant in.

I'm on a jazz music forum and one of the thread categories there is for musicians. There we talk about tritone substitutions, drop 2 voicings, chord nomenclature, functional vs non-functional harmony, chord scales vs pitch collections, and so on, things that most non-musicians wouldn't have any understand of or even interest in at all.

So here I've blundered into this thread and shown my ass. I consider it a lesson learned. I have no business posting on this thread. My mistake.

But I'll continue reading it.

[Jac3510]

It strikes me there are a number of issues of style and presentation. Chris your posts are not immune to sounding a little patronising at times, I gather mine do to. Hack really does not suffer who he feels are fools gladly. And on RatSkep one has to deal with the likes of the moron Byers and frankly the only way to deal with a moronic idiot like him is to rubbish his ideas in the most vociferous ways. I think Hack is having to get used to dealing with you in a different way. Can you not tolerate his learning curve for the good of constructive discussion if he tries too? If Byers came here I reckon Whitney would give him 20 posts at most before showing him the door. Because of the staff structure at RatSkep and many forums trolls and morons get much too much air play before getting kicked out. The structure here of benevolent dictatorship is generally much better at rooting out extreme members. I thinks that one has to get a feel for the this forum and it took me a while.

Another issue is that the subject you're a jousting over is hideously complex and far reaching. Maybe you should could both start of something simpler and on common ground to get to appreciate each others good points.

I think if both of you just counted 10 before hitting the submit button and reread your posts as if you were the intended recipient you may moderate your own approach to each other and we won't end up in a downward spiral of mutual derision.

It would be a great misfortune if you both can't find a way to debate without belittling each other.

I understand the position he finds himself in. I'm not going to sit here and start throwing other Christians under the bus, but do keep in mind, I work with them for a living, so I am very, very well aware of the difficulties you face. With that said, one of the major themes of atheists generally these days is ethics, and especially in the face of religious evil, the fact that atheists can be just as moral (and some would argue more for reasons I'm sure you are aware) as any believer.

Concerning this idea of ethics and morality, whether it is subjective or objective, honesty and respect are a basic concept we should all be able to agree on. Children lose their temper. Adults reason through issues, and if they encounter a person who is unreasonable, they simply remove themselves from the debate. In my own case here, I am fully aware that I am in the minority view, yet I still trust the general judgment of the community with regard to a poster's basic intelligence and their arguments' coherence. I really don't feel like I need to try to convince anyone here (or anywhere else) that someone else is an idiot. It's enough to point out problems in positions. Our responses to arguments, I think, tell people much more about our true intellect and character than our basic positions.

With regard to my own statements, I hope you know that they aren't intended to be patronizing. I would ask that you let me know if anything comes across that way. A PM is just fine in that regard. There is an old statement I hold to be true: "A man convinced against his will is of the same opinion still." It doesn't matter, then, how fantastic or sound or logical an argument is. If the character of the person delivering it is questionable, or if the motivations are wrong, it will fall of deaf ears.

Finally, with regard to Hack, my basic position hasn't changed. I'm more than willing to engage in rational discussion of the issues with him or with anyone. I won't allow rhetorical games to substitute, however, for such discussion. As I said before, it is a matter of respect. I don't think it is so much that Hack needs to learn the board environment as it is that he needs to learn to honestly critique positions with which he disagrees. As I have emphasized, pronouncements are not debate, especially when those pronouncements are demonstrably false, as in the case of the ones he has made.

So if he wants to honestly consider my argument, then I am all up for continued discussion. My assumptions by this point are rather obvious. I hold that things are what they are, and that they are not what they are not. I hold that what we are is not the same thing as that we are; I hold that both of these are distinct from what we are made up of. He can accept them or challenge them. So long as he chooses to deal with the statements I make themselves and not misrepresent them, as he did in his last substantive reply, I look forward to discussing the issues in more detail. If he won't, then everyone loses. I lose because my arguments are not critiqued and thus are not as strong as they could be. He loses because he doesn't get to demonstrate the fallacy in one of the longest running arguments, though least popular, in Christian history. The board loses because it does not get to see the issues discussed in depth.

It's in his court.

[Thumpalumpacus]

Indeed. He's been doing philosophy in this very thread.

Uh-oh, I better go do some ritual cleansing.  

[Thumpalumpacus]

I think I need to apologize. I've become used to opening threads without noticing what category they're in. This thread is in the Philosophy category, an area that I'm basically ignorant in.

I'm on a jazz music forum and one of the thread categories there is for musicians. There we talk about tritone substitutions, drop 2 voicings, chord nomenclature, functional vs non-functional harmony, chord scales vs pitch collections, and so on, things that most non-musicians wouldn't have any understand of or even interest in at all.

So here I've blundered into this thread and shown my ass. I consider it a lesson learned. I have no business posting on this thread. My mistake.

But I'll continue reading it.

It would appear that I'm your partner in error here.

[Jac3510]

Hello jac3510 (Chris),

Jac is fine - there are enough Chris' on this board.

Though I have and will continue to insist that at this juncture some technical vocabulary is necessary, I do promise that I am looking for ways to better communicate these concepts. Perhaps, if nothing else, this will be the primary mutual benefit between the HAF community and me. Who knows? My point is simply that I don't take it personally, and I am trying to make these admittedly difficult concepts as clear as possible.

By the way, we are all philosophers, just like we are all theologians. Some of us are just better at it than others. I, for example, am an absolutely terrible mathematician. I can barely factor a polynomial. It is rather embarrassing. But language make sense to me . . . anyway, I know that isn't what you meant, per se, but I do think it is of some importance. What "professional philosophers" do isn't all that different from what we are doing here. They are just doing it on full time, so they have developed a particular expertise in it is all. That hardly means, though, that their observations are more valuable than anyone else's. It is, as I have said before (in my view), the argument that is important, not the qualification of the person making it. A bad argument is pretty language made by a PhD is still a bad argument.

It seems that the english speaking forum members have enough problems grasping the individual determinations of the words in the statements you use. We need a thesaurus and a lot of time to even agree on the definitions of things like "subsistent existence" or even a simple one like "being" (Shakespeare comes to mind, but let's not deviate from my train of thought)

Unfortunately, a thesaurus probably won't help, and still less a dictionary, because most of these terms are technical. I try to define them when I use them, but I know that still makes it difficult on some issues. Rest assured most of the other issues on my mind (though certainly not all) don't require nearly this level of discussion--require being the key word.

I see religion and the dogma of religion and the various derivatives of these interpretations for what they are and the problem you are having getting your point across as the same: An interpretation problem.

I would agree with you perhaps more than you might expect. The particular area of philosophy I study in is technically called hermeneutics. It comes from the name of the Greek god Hermes, who was the messenger of the gods. As such, it refers the field of study that focuses on how we communicate. It is to linguistics (the study of language) what epistemology (the study of knowledge) is to metaphysics or ontology (the study of the nature of reality). We start with the brute fact that reality exists. Metaphysics asks, "What is reality" and answers it by studying the nature of existence. Epistemology says, "How do we know things about this reality?" The two are separate, and metaphysics definitely comes before epistemology, but you really can't do one without the other, as they both raise questions about one another. Linguistics asks how we communicate what we know, and so comes after epistemology, and hermeneutics asks how we understand what is communicated. So language is the reality that hermeneutics deals with, whereas reality as it enters our mind is the reality that that epistemology deals with.

I give you all that background to make this simple statement. I am absolutely convinced that the method of interpretation one employs (which is a hermeneutical question) does more than anything else to determine the outcome of your investigation. I'll give you two quick examples to demonstrate, one from theological studies, and one from philosophical studies:

1. In theological studies, there is a school of thought called dispensationalism (I hold to it). The main idea underlying this school is that the Church and Israel are not the same thing, and that all the promises to Israel in the Old Testament are still waiting to be fulfilled in the actual Jewish people. Against this is a school called covenant theology. The main idea underlying that school is that the Church and Israel are one and the same, that Israel was replaced by the Church as God's chosen people when they rejected Christ and put Him on the Cross. As such, the promises of the Old Testament are being fulfilled in an spiritual (that is, non-literal) sense in the Church. Now, what underlies the disagreement is the method of interpretation. Dispensationalists insist on taking the text literally (which takes into account figures of speech and such). If the text says "Israel" it means Israel and if it says "Church" it means the church. Covenant theologians, however, have an allegorical (that is, non-literal) method of interpretation when it comes to prophecy, so they are allowed to conflate the two. If, then, you choose a literal hermeneutic, you are virtually guaranteed to become a dispensationlist; whereas if you choose an allegorical hermeneutic, you are virtually guaranteed to become a Covenant theologian (which is the position held be the vast majority of Christians). So yes, interpretation is the problem.

2. Modern philosophy can be distinguished into two general schools of thought: classical vs. analytical philosophy. The former follows the method I outlined above. It starts with a study of existence itself and moves out from there. The latter, however, following Descarte, Kant, and Hume, believe that we cannot know anything about the real world itself, but only our sensory perceptions of the real world. This has been humorously demonstrated in this video: http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid ... 060678292#

The interpretational methods are vastly different. Those who follow classical philosophy interpret the world according to reality itself (we believe), whereas analytical philosophers find that position to be naive and instead interpret the world through our concepts and language. My side things you can talk about reality. Analytical philosophers don't.

So, yes, the main problem is with interpretation, but underlying the issue of interpretation is why we ought to interpret one way or another.

You may have a valid point trying to prove that "the thing in which all perfections are obtained" should have a name. You use the word "god". I would choose the word "everything". That would explain it all... (that might be the Toaistic world view though...)

I will stay out of the dicussion untill I had some proper time to re-read the entire thread, and tried to make some sense of it.

The problem with the word "everything" is that it is not a thing that causes anything. It is a collective noun. "Everything" doesn't make a thing happen. Something in "everything," you or me, for instance, makes things happen. This goes back to the very same objection I leveled against both Hack and i_am_i. If "everything" or "the universe" is the cause of all being, then there is no distinction between us and everything. All is One and One is All. There is no distinction between you and me, you and your computer, you and trees, cats, dogs, or ducks. If "everything" is the cause of what you do, that includes me, my baby, the grass in my yard, etc. And likewise, you are the cause of everything I do. Now, this takes me back to the law of identity I mentioned to you in my last reply. It basically says this:

To say something is different from something else is to say it is different by something. You are different from me because there are things about you that are not the same about me (i.e., where you live, your age, the matter that makes up your body, etc.). But if everything is the cause of everything, that obscures all such distinctions. I wouldn't be able to point to anything in you and say it is different from anything in me, because everything in you was caused be me, and the very same things in me were caused by you. The causes, then, turn out to be completely identical, as would necessarily the effects. Any difference in effect would be an illusion created by our mind.

Yet obviously that is absurd. You are not me, and I am not you. So "everything" isn't the cause of everything, much less anything. We require a singular thing (roughly speaking) to be the cause of everything. The catch word to call a "thing" that has all "perfections" in it is "God." You can call it what you like, including the Invisible Flying Spaghetti Monster if you like. I don't care. If we agree that this thing is the cause of all being, that it transcends space, time, and matter, and that it has wisdom, will, knowledge, personhood, power, morality, existence, creativity, etc. all without measure, then what we call it isn't important. I call it God. Germans call it Gott. The Greeks call it Theos, the Hebrews Elohim, the Arabs Allah, etc. Call it Flargh. Call it whatever.

The question is simply and only what is the Cause of all things, and what can we know about it? It turns out a great deal, because all causes are known by their effects, and there are a great many effects that can be studied in this world.

One final question:

How would Leibniz' law of identity deal with the existence of that in which all imperfections are obtained, and what would you call that?

Regards,

Chris B.

If such a thing were possible (and I don't see how it would be), Leibniz' law would probably assert that there would be an infinite of such things. The reason is that imperfection is a scale. I can be more or less imperfect. To take the example of sight, my ability to see is better than my brother's, but worse than my wife's, and I suspect it will get worse as I get older. So Leibniz would allow me to site that difference and therefore actually have a different thing.

Now, again, I don't see how you could put together an argument that would give us any reason to believe a being that obtains all imperfections (which would have to mean obtains all perfections in an imperfect way). But if someone were to construct such an argument, I would be willing to consider it.

I hope that was clearer

[Jac3510]

Sorry to butt in, but....

Essence is what a thing is. The universe may exist, but they universe is not existence. If it were existence itself, then to say, "Mankind exists" would be to say "Mankind is the universe" or something related. The universe may be all that exists (it isn't), but being all that exists means that it is not itself existence. You are simply wrong on this point.

Not that I'm intending to speak for him but I think what Hack was trying to say is matter alone (whatever fundamental comprises the universe) is existence. Existence can only exist while something exists. In this regard it can be perceived as existence itself. To exist is to be in existence. The whole can only exist if the most fundamental entity does.

But matter itself is not existence, otherwise, the sentence "matter exists" would be tautological. Things that exist certainly are made of matter, but matter is no more existence than the things that are made out of matter are existence. Besides, I believe in another post somewhere you acknowledged that thoughts are not made up of matter, though you argued (correct, I think) that they are tied to the brain, which is matter. In any case, if matter is existence, and thoughts aren't made of matter--only the brain--then while the brain exists, then thoughts wouldn't. I think most of us would have a serious time with any position that says "thoughts and ideas don't exist."

Moreover, science has taught us that energy is not matter, though the two can be converted back and forth. If they were the same, then it would be meaningless to say that they could be converted. There does seem to be a difference in an atom and the energy it has in it. If, though, matter were existence, then you couldn't argue that energy existed, which would also be absurd. Now, full disclosure, I am not a scientist! This entire paragraph could be wrong, and if it is, I am completely open to correction. This is nothing more than my understanding of the issue as I have read in the popular literature explaining the science (you know--the "plain English" everybody is after ). But it does seem that matter and energy are different. Energy may be found in matter, but something can't be in something else if they are the same thing.

Dogs are efficiently caused causes. Their essence, what they are, is "dogness."

This sounds Platonic.

Or Aristotelian. The two have a different view of what is called participation. Plato thought that there was a "perfect dog" in the heavens, and that all dogs "participated" in this perfect form in one way or another. Aristotle taught (rightly, I think) that all that exists is individual. There is no perfect dog form in which all dogs participate. What the thing is, is a dog. Because it is a dog, it is not, say, a cat.

In any case, I am most definitely not a Platonist. All that exists is individual, and things are what they are, not in virtue of participating in some perfect form in heaven, but in virtue of the fact that they simply are what they are. What they are is perceived by our mind, and then we get into the epistemological questions.

Therefore, existence is added to the essence of dogs to make them exist.

You've got it backwards. Essence is added to the dogs. "Existence before essence." ~Jean-Paul Sartre

No, I believe that existence precedes essence, but while I have not read Sartre, I am willing to be that you have misinterpreted him here. Essence is not added to the dog, because the essence of the thing is that it is a dog. Even if you say, "essence is added to the dog," you are still left with the question what is a dog? And when you answer that, that is what I will label its essence or form or nature or what have you.

A little background is helpful here. Aristotle taught that existence is rooted in form. For him, for something to have an essence ultimately meant that it existed (that which did not exist was form that was not combined with matter; in other words, matterless-form didn't exist, but form gave existence to matter). In this view, essence--that is, form--precedes existence. Averroes came along and corrected Aristotle on this. He correctly deduced that we cannot perceive any essence without first judging that it exists, and thus, existence precedes essence. Now, you will note I made this statement in the first premise of my argument. Allow me to quote it for you:

"1. Being is an accidental property of efficiently caused causes (although it is accidental in the unique sense of being prior to both essence and all other accidents)."

The bolded part makes clear that existence precedes essence. It does not follow, however, that essence is added to dogs. That is meaningless. You may as well say "Dogs are added to dogs." So existence is added to the essence dog, and in doing so, the dog exists. You could argue for semantics that the essence "dog" is added to existence, but that would make existence the essential property, which I promise you, you don't want to do. You would immediately be forced to conclude that God exists via the Ontological Argument. We should be well past that.

So in reality, the first thing that we perceive is existence, because existence gives reality to an essence. The two concepts must be distinguished.

[humblesmurph]

I watched the video.  I have no proof of the outside physical world.  What I do have is the consistency and predictability of my perceptions.  I perceive that I am typing, I perceive words appearing  on a screen.  Every single time I perceive myself typing, I perceive words on a screen.  At some later time, I will perceive a response from you that is related to these words I perceive myself to be typing right now.  Every time I perceive myself typing to Chris, at some later point I perceive a related message on a screen (unless he foe'd me).

 It's the consistency and predictability of my perceptions that allow me to get along in the world even though I can never really be sure what it is that I am perceiving.  I could be in the Matrix, but If I was, I would never know it until somebody pulled the plug.

[i_am_i]

But matter itself is not existence, otherwise, the sentence "matter exists" would be tautological. Things that exist certainly are made of matter, but matter is no more existence than the things that are made out of matter are existence. Besides, I believe in another post somewhere you acknowledged that thoughts are not made up of matter, though you argued (correct, I think) that they are tied to the brain, which is matter. In any case, if matter is existence, and thoughts aren't made of matter--only the brain--then while the brain exists, then thoughts wouldn't. I think most of us would have a serious time with any position that says "thoughts and ideas don't exist."

Interesting. Does existence exist?

[Jac3510]

I watched the video.  I have no proof of the outside physical world.  What I do have is the consistency and predictability of my perceptions.  I perceive that I am typing, I perceive words appearing  on a screen.  Every single time I perceive myself typing, I perceive words on a screen.  At some later time, I will perceive a response from you that is related to these words I perceive myself to be typing right now.  Every time I perceive myself typing to Chris, at some later point I perceive a related message on a screen (unless he foe'd me).

It's the consistency and predictability of my perceptions that allow me to get along in the world even though I can never really be sure what it is that I am perceiving.  I could be in the Matrix, but If I was, I would never know it until somebody pulled the plug.

You, sir, will very likely never be foe'd

Yes, I think so. I think we must affirm that it does (after all, a non-existing thing can do anything, i.e., bring something into existence). But if existence exists as itself and not in something like dogs, then you have just concluded with me that what we call "subsistent existence" is real, or what other philosophers call The First Cause or The Prime Mover.

If self-existent existence is the cause of everything, then nothing is the cause of it. All that remains is examining the nature of this existence before we find God.

[i_am_i]

Interesting. Does existence exist?

Ah, see that is the question I have been getting at in this entire thread.

Yes, I think so. I think we must affirm that it does (after all, a non-existing thing can do anything, i.e., bring something into existence).

I'd like to back up to this statement, if you don't mind, and ask you how a non-existing thing can do anything. So, how can a non-existing thing do anything?

[Jac3510]

Typo - can't do anything. A non-existent thing can't do anything, which is why, it seems to me, existence must exist in itself in some sense if it is going to bring anything else into existence.

[i_am_i]

Typo - can't do anything. A non-existent thing can't do anything, which is why, it seems to me, existence must exist in itself in some sense if it is going to bring anything else into existence.

Fair enough, got it now.

So existence causes or brings about existence, is that what you're saying?